Animal Rights

Essay by Ron V.P.University, Bachelor'sA+, December 1996

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Animal rights is a very fragile topic. Opposing sides have strong reasons

to stand for either of their believes, leading to many ethical questions.

One of the major questions is who is right and who is wrong? There is no

one right answer, but instead million of them based upon our own individual

opinion, and the opinions are formed on how we feel about the facts. Animal

research, test, and use has taken humanity a long way, with its advances in

medicine and as a major source of food, but it is not morally correct to

abuse, test, use, and ultimately kill the animals unnecessarily, especially

for our comforts, luxuries, and greed.

Many benefits have been obtained through animals, mostly in the field of

Medicine. The medical world has rapidly moved forward finding cures for many diseases through animal testing, giving new alternatives and shining a new light for illnesses that did not have a cure before.

Working with animals

like monkeys and dogs have resulted in successful open heart surgeries on

people, as well as organ transplants, and the cardiac pace maker.

The disease polio, which killed and disabled many children, is almost

completely vanished from the United States by the used of preventive vaccines that were perfected on monkeys. Not only polio, but also mumps, measles,rubella and smallpox have been eliminated through antibiotics tested on monkeys. Major diseases have been alleviated and have had major advances totheir cure, diseases such as leukemia in children among other types of cancerand tumors. Animals not only contribute greatly in medicine, but through out the history of human kind they have been consumed as food, being a majorsource for the basic nutrition.

Unfortunately, some research has gone too far, putting many animals through unnecessary pain. According to Jean Bethke Elshtain, a...